Ethiopian police detain parents of Somali former Minister

Security forces in Ethiopia’s Somali state Wednesday detained the parents of a former minister who recently resigned from the Federal government.

Immediate former minister for Women and Youth Filsan Ahmed said in a tweet her parents had been detained in Jigjiga and undergoing interrogation.

Filsan resigned last month after a fall out with the Abiy Ahmed administration and has since become a critic of the ongoing war between the government and the Tigray Peoples Liberation Forces (TPLF).

In a tweet, Filsan said Abiy Ahmed’s changes at the beginning of the Administration had now become a tragedy.

“The winds of change that carried with it a promise of a better tomorrow and prospects of a peaceful and prosperous Ethiopia has, unfortunately, turned into a nightmarish storm that has thrown our country off its course,” Filsan tweeted. “We are a country on the precipice holding on by a thread.”

It was not immediately clear if her parents had been released at the time of publishing this story.

The developments come amid a crackdown of dissenting forces by the Federal Government in Addis Ababa.

The UN said Wednesday at least nine of its staff and dependents had been detained by authorities in Addis Ababa.